Friday, June 02, 2017

Did Draupadi laugh at Duryodhana?

In the Mahabharatham as popularly portrayed, Draupadi laughs at Duryodhana when he falls into a pool. This is later cited as a reason as to his behavior towards Draupadi in the game of dice.

Is this true?

Indraprastha was built by Maya, the architect of the Asuras. The nature of this palace is that nothing is what it seems like. Only someone with a high level of control over his mind can actually see things as they are.

This appears to be an allegory to the world itself. Maya can be translated as illusion. Adi Shankara uses the rope & snake analogy to describe the world as Mithya (Bhrahmam Satyam Jagan Mithya: ब्रह्म सत्यं जगन्मिथ्या). What you think is a snake is actually a rope. The world is not what it seems to be. To transcend it, meditate and gain control over your mind, to see the world as what it truly is.

Duryodhana has poor control over his mind. When he goes through Indraprastha, he mistakes initially solid ground for water & later the reverse. He falls into the water. When he falls, Bhima, his retinue of attendants, Arjuna, Nakula & Sahadeva laugh. There is no mention whatsoever of Draupadi. There is also no mention of Yudhishtira laughing.

So, where did this come from?

Duryodhana later complains to Drithirashtra, requesting him to invite the Pandavas to a game of dice, which Drithirashtra is reluctant to do. He praises Yudhishtira's conduct who treated him with respect & gave him wonderful gifts. He also states that Yudhishtira immediately helped provide a change of clothes. This means Yudhishtira was present, but he had enough control over his mind that he didn't laugh.

Sometimes, when someone has an ungainly moment & injures oneself, the first instinct of the mind is to laugh. Only an instant later would we realize that the person is injured and the helpful instincts kick in. Yudhishtira has transcended the normal state of mind.

Duryodhana also speaks well of Nakula & Sahadeva who treated him with concern & supported him when he got injured. It appears that Nakula & Sahadeva laughed, but without malice. He is critical of Arjuna & especially Bhima, who appears to have found Duryodhana's inability to navigate Indraprasta funny.

In this rant, he also mentions Draupaid & her maids, who laughed.

In the original episode, there is mention of even Bhima's attendants, but no mention of Draupadi or her attendants. Later, we have only Duryodhana's word for this episode. It appears that Duryodhana may have lied to add color to the episode, to convince a reluctant Drithirashtra to invite the Pandavas over to the game of dice.

Draupadi laughing at Duryodhana is not supported by the original reference, given the amount of detail in who laughed.

Draupadi calling Duryodhana: blind son of a blind father (andha ka beta andha) is a creative rewrite of the original episode by recent playwrights. There is no original reference supporting this.

1 comment:

Unknown said...

True indeed